Systems and methods for providing a broadcast entertainment service and an on-demand entertainment service

Abstract

The present invention provides systems and methods for, in some cases, supplementing a broadcast media service with an on-demand and personalized media service.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS[0001]This application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10 / 339,425, filed on Jan. 9, 2003, which claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60 / 390,312, filed Jun. 21, 2002 and U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60 / 395,360, filed Jul. 12, 2002 and which is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10 / 098,620, filed Mar. 18, 2002; this application also claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent application No. 60 / 612,618, filed Sep. 24, 2004. All of the above referenced applications are incorporated herein by this reference.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0002]1. Field of the Invention[0003]This invention is related to entertainment and information system, and, more specifically, to broadcast, on-demand and / or personalized entertainment and information systems.[0004]2. Discussion of the Background[0005]Broadcasters, such as music broadcasters (e.g., conventional radio stations a...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0014]After receiving the information identifying the channel profile selected by the user, the on-demand system may select one or more media assets that match the selected channel profile, establish an on-demand session with the client system, and, after establishing the on-demand session, transmit to the client system the selected media asset(s). In some embodiments, the process of selecting additional media assets and then transmitting those assets to the client system may continue for a predetermined or indefinite period of time. In this way, the system may provide a personalized entertainment system. Advantageously, in some embodiments, one or more of the selected media assets include commercial elements, promotional message, etc. For example, a selected media asset may be a short (e.g., 30 second) video advertisement.

Problems solved by technology

Broadcasters, such as music broadcasters (e.g., conventional radio stations and other broadcasters of music, video or multimedia works) must accommodate the tastes of a mass audience, and, as we all know, it is not possible to please all of the people all of the time; we each have our own unique likes and dislikes.

However, this is not a practical solution because there is only a finite amount of bandwidth available to broadcast music, and this bandwidth is already at or near capacity.

Further, it is prohibitively expensive to create additional broadcast bandwidth.

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